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You Have Worth

For the past few weeks I have been receiving comments on my blog under the post “The Story” from a guy who is not only anti-gun, he is pro-criminal. I have largely ignored him because I haven’t had the time or energy to engage him, but last night he gave the full court press and he made comments that essentially said my daughter and I are worthless.

I still have no desire to address him or the likes of him, but I do want to address those of you who read my blog who might read comments like his and be deceived by them. I care too much about you to not at least try to keep that from happening.

Here is his latest comment addressed directly to me….

“AGirl, when you travel the road to my home you will not carry a gun, a knife, or even a sharpened stick. There is no need, no one will threaten you.

If you are carrying weapons, unarmed police officers will invite you to leave them safely in their care.

My children play and learn in a gun-free environment, where disputes are resolved by logic, consensus and the rule of law that is enacted and upheld by the huge majority of people.

Our senior citizens sleep securely a night, travel unhindered and happy through their autumn years.

I am so sorry that you have become a victim of violence and have chosen to use lethal weapons as a response. As i have argued, it is in my view, short-sighted, counter productive and only serves in the long run to hugely worsen a bad situation of a violent and dangerous society where fear carries more weight than respect.

Remember, if you carry a gun, people don’t respect you, they fear the gun.

Interestingly most of the comments opposing my views have been themselves harsh, personally abusive, violent in nature and empty of hard evidence supporting their cause. Emotional and knee-jerk reactions to any external view or opinion.

I will wish you well, along with the other commentators to this blog. I won’t comment further here as i doubt it would be welcomed – one final thought: to be truly free, first free your mind.”

I am not going to address each statement, but I will say a few things. One is that I did not “become a victim”. I was victimized. A bad guy did a bad thing and because of people like the commenter I allowed my mind to be conditioned in such a way that I did not defend what is rightfully defend-able. My life and that of my child’s. In addition, I am no longer in that place. I was victimized for that brief amount of time when the bad guy was doing a bad thing and I continued to victimize myself for a while as I came to grips with what had happened, but I did not become a victim and I will not allow anyone to victimize me again. I am not ruled by or griped by fear, revenge, anger, or malice. I am ruled by peace, calm and a determination to never again lay on my back and let someone do whatever they want with me. In fact, they can’t do what ever they want with me if I am standing up either. And of all things I can promise you, I can promise you this, no one at anytime, ever, under any circumstance will be allowed to harm my child again. One will literally have to kill me and that just isn’t going to happen.

“…they don’t respect you, they fear the gun” I want to be very clear, I do not carry a gun for respect or attention or power. I could careless what anyone thinks of me personally, but I also want to be clear, a gun is nothing more than a thing. I would not waste my time being afraid of an inanimate object, however, if you come to do me or my family harm, you ought to be afraid. Not of the weapon available to me, but of me. I will do whatever it takes to stop someone from being violent towards me or those I love.

This commenter tries to deceive us into thinking that he is kind and benevolent and that he wants peace for all people. That all people are equal and therefore all deserve the same treatment regardless of their behavior. Kumbaya and all that.

Here is what I want you to understand, he does not think all people are equal and deserve to live a peaceful life. He believes that bad guys have the right to kill and good guys have the right to die. He believes your life and mine are less valuable. He believes that in allowing yourself to be killed the bad guy now has the opportunity to due process(found in a separate comment on same post). In the end his entire argument is that no one has the right to be murdered, but if there is a choice between good and evil, evil should get his day in court.

Regardless of what kind of childhood or mental illness a murderer or rapist has, that reality does not make him more valuable, more worth saving, more worth defending.

As caring and compassionate people it is sometimes easy to be fooled by the idea that if the world was gun free we would all be safe and life would be full of unicorns and cookies, but it doesn’t require much effort to find circumstances where evil prevailed time and time again in no gun zones. Lets look at his example of the 2×4(found in a separate comment on same post). A 200 lb man with a 2×4 or a kitchen knife, or a brick, or a sledgehammer or a heavy lamp or rope or his bare hands would likely be a bit of a challenge for my 119 lb frame. I am not saying he will be successful in his desire to kill me, but I am saying my chances are a bit better with a tool that helps level the fighting field.

His entire argument to me is that my life has no value. That my daughter’s life has no value. That at the end of the day I should willingly give up my life and stand by and watch my daughter be murdered because in fighting back I am infringing upon the criminal’s right to Due Process. Compare that to the “Pro-Life Gun” folks who have told me day after day after day that I am valuable. That not only is it ok for me to fight back, but they showed me how to do it.

People who didn’t know me took the time to come here for over a year and say, “You matter.” For over a year, I was encouraged and supported. That is a long time. It would have been easy for folks to pop over here leave a nice word or two and be on their way, but they stayed and they helped me. I didn’t do anything for them, nothing and yet i was continually offered not only words, but actions. In their words and actions I found the strength to forgive myself, to help my daughter heal, to help other people find their own courage and to find resources and tools that, if ever needed again, I could use to defend a life worth defending. Mine.

Anyone can visit a blog and spew hurtful words, but when people call you up to offer a shoulder. When they offer to give you a place to stay for the night. When people take time from their families to take you to the range to teach you how to use a gun effectively and responsibly. When they come and find you and say, let me help you learn how to fight and kick and scratch and think outside the box. When they repeat more times than anyone should have to, you can do this. That’s when you know they care.

I don’t know about you, but when I am looking for advice from someone in any area of my life, I do not look to the one trying to do me harm for their own benefit or worse, for no benefit at all. Anti-gun, pro-criminal people have nothing positive or helpful to offer anyone except the bad guy. In following their suggestions, nothing is gained. The bad guys don’t stop being bad. The world doesn’t get more safe. The crime rate doesn’t go down. What they offer is not only unhelpful, it is dangerous. Understand, trying to take away our guns is not the most dangerous thing about their argument. The most dangerous thing about these people is that they want to affect our minds. They want to convince us that we do not matter. That we have no value. That if we were truly decent and caring people we would care more about the man trying to shove parts of his body into you or me by force than our right not to have that happen. Think about that…

You might want to think carefully about listening to and following the advice of someone whose sole argument is, you have no value, but the bad guy does.

If you get nothing else from this blog, please get this…YOU HAVE VALUE! Your life has value. All by itself your life has value. You have the right not to be mugged, raped, beaten or murdered, anywhere at anytime, by anyone and you most certainly have the right to do your best to stop someone who is trying to do any of those things to you. There isn’t a single moral, religious or statistical argument that carries more weight than YOU are valuable. YOU have worth. Not because you are a mother or a wife. Not because you volunteer at the local shelter. Not for any reason other than your life is a gift and as such no one has the right to forcibly take it from you and if they try then you have every right to say, No, not today. Not EVER!

90 thoughts on “You Have Worth”

Hey there AGirl – nice post. I am always amazed and saddened by the person who looks in the mirror and simply does not see God’s gift to the world. You do great work here giving folks a chance to mend, sharing your story that other’s can learn . . . . you’re doing a great deal of good.

As for the troll – a few thoughts of my own.

He’s not real – the comments on his community itself indicates he’s simply “pokin’ the bear” – no such community exists anywhere on the planet – period.

“Bad” is hard to understand . . . . it is not the natural state of people. That great thinker – George Burns – once said in the movie “Oh God” – how can we understand Good if their is not Bad? And that is true. It’s what we feed that tells the tale. If we feed Good, goodness grows, communities we live in do become nicer places to live, things do become safer. But Evil will always be around the edges just to test things out. If we submit to Evil – it grows.

The guy’s a fake – feeding the “Bad”. You, Ma’am are as real as it gets – and you DO feed the Good.

Brava!! “You have value.” That is one important reason why cretins and defectives (for so we have been called) like me and my kind do what we do..

If I have the right person, Poster’s argument fails here:
“What we need to do is de-weaponize society.”
By definition, a criminal has set or her- or himself outside society. Thus, de-weaponizing society creates a(n under)class of potential victim far greater than would exist otherwise and does nothing to limit the power of the criminal. Rational individuals reject such a proposition. (Is Congress rational?)

It is hard for me to comprehend such thinking. Even when I was not a big fan of guns, I never ever thought someone should be rendered a perpetual victim and I was never so naive as to think the criminals would follow the laws.

The logic of his argument is that since everybody is peaceful and there is peace everywhere that there is no need for weapons. His premise is clearly incorrect, as you have experienced this “peace” he dreams about. Anybody who believes that crime doesn’t exist is clearly deluded.

Actually, there are places where cops are unarmed. In the UK, where two unarmed women police officers were killed by a gunman. The man is either in the UK or is working to build support for the UN Gun Ban and thinks we can live in a utopian world if we eliminate the right to own a gun. But history has shown that only the law abiding individuals obey the law and give up their guns. That is why we need to fight for our right to protect ourselves.

Trolls like this guy are out to see if they can find a little sliver of hesitancy in others, to push their ideology on others and undermine their independence and inner strength. Stand strong, as you advocate for other women to do. And allowing yourself to be a victim means you never fight back, you always give in. Being victimized means someone got the upper hand on you, and you may have fought back and lost temporarily, but you will fight to prevent that from happening again. As we all must.

I am learning that it isn’t my job to get everyone to take responsibility for their lives. I try, but if they are in my real life(not virtual) and they refuse, I let them make that choice because otherwise it is draining just as you stated.

I know I am preaching to the choir here…. but with idiots like the troll….all one can really do is ignore them. They are just not worth the agravation to deal with. What I am wondering though….and my bet is…this guy is like a spider. He is spinning a web. Now, I don’t know about the rest of you…but if he truly lives in that kind of place where there is “no danger”…..yeah right….no way in hell would I ever want to go visit him….you might just never come back! It could also be he is some kind of religious nut. Either way, as I said….his kind I literally just trod under my foot. Something else to condsider…and while this may seem a little far fetched I believe it to have merit. Every human I have come across in my life has their eyes in front of their head…not like a rabbit with its eyes to the side…. Well, gee, so do wolves, hawks, eagles, lions etc. all have their eyes facint front. Hmmm….ok….that means that the “power” to good or evil lies within one. So…..to make a long story short…Who in their right mind would leave to chance any encounter with any other human? Not me!

“Religious nut” is an interesting description. Not that you’re wrong; it’s just interesting.

In my experience, a “religious nut” may or may not be a person of true faith. I’ve known several that can quote scripture, but they have no idea what they’re talking about. They read, but do not comprehend. They know, but do not understand. They hear the words, but do not grasp the Word.

I’m not terribly out-spoken when it comes to religion or faith, but my life was given to me by my Creator, and my family’s lives were entrusted to me by the same Creator to protect until they could protect themselves. They are the greatest gift I will ever receive, and to cast them aside on the words of a stranger – a mere mortal – is the moral equivalent of flipping the bird to God and saying, “Thanks, but this cretin has more power over me than You do. His will will be done today.”

And you do NOT want to play chicken with the Almighty.

@ A Girl: I’m a relatively new follower of your site, and your writing is downright inspiring! Thank you so much for sharing your stories and experiences with the rest of us, and keep up the good works! 🙂

Lovely response. We do have value. I think that is what saddens me about the anti-gun crowf the most. They don’t see their worth. They don’t believe themselves worth fighting for. I for one refuse to teach that to my children. You are eloquent as always.

It is sad. Not all feel that way, but many, most do. When I was anti gun, I thought I had value, but I certainly was caught up in the idea of being nice and being nicer to the bad guy than to myself. Not that day in the parking lot, just generally speaking, but I don’t believe this person believes any of us have value.

After 32 years of being a cop, 20+ years in the Army National Gaurd with 2 deployments, I have learned that there are:
1.) Sheep
2.) Wolves
3.) Sheep dogs
4.) And sheep who arm themselves to be better than the wolves.

What is really sad is that there are truly people out there who actually believe in this false utopia. They are convinced of their illusion and are blissfully unaware of reality and will refuse to accept it even if it hits them in the face. They cannot comprehend the inalienable right of being and are immersed in the collective illusion of their self-created fantasy land and are content to remain there, but continue to berate us for not joining them in their false paradise. It saddens me.

It saddens me too. I really, saddens me. I know how painful it is to be awaken from those illusions and I am not being flippant when I say, I am sad for those that refuse to see the errors of their thinking.

Whoever this individual is he is baiting you or in other words a Troll who finds his own sense of worth in belittling others. People who choose to impart this torment on others may be doing it for personal empowerment or simply because they enjoy it. Some are in enough of a state of self-denial that it is unlikely they can articulate why they do things like this. Anyone who truly believes the line of idealistic dogma this person is spouting is in denial of actual reality. Choosing to go armed, learning to protect yourself and family is an act of individual will, taking responsibility for your own actions. Taking the opposite course of action of not protecting yourself and family because of religious or moral objections to violence are also a conscious act of will. Believing all discord can be solved through rational dialog will work in many instances, but not in all of them. Life is all about risk and this country was founded under auspices of free will.

Being bated is why i have ignired him for ovet a month. Nothing he said impacted me and i didnt believe anything i said would imoact him. His behavior and or words arent what get me to act. I decided to write a post out of my concern for others not out if a desire to chamfe his mind.

Dang…they say Tolkien is the father of the fantasy genre…this guy must be his great-grandson! Seriously…for someone who is so “enlightened”, he obviously has no clue about human nature. I’m no expert myself, but I’ve done some basic research on human nature and various personality types/disorders. As long as there are more than two human beings on the face of this planet, they will disagree, and there are more than enough that will resort to violence. There is no way to get rid of those who wish to force their desires upon others, whether it be the desire to have something of yours, or deny you something, or simply to force their beliefs upon you. Its called human nature. Simply by existing, you’ve pissed someone off today (Google “Muslim extremism”). That’s not going to change. And by giving these individuals what they want, well, as Train said it in their song “Calling All Angels”, “In a world that what we want is only what we want until it’s ours”, giving in only makes these folks want more.

Now, if you want to get Biblical, this is called “sin”, and has been with us since Adam and Eve were kicked out of the Garden. Also according to the Bible, it will be with us until Jesus comes back to reclaim us as His own. Just before He left, He gave His disciples some very specific instructions in Luke 22, starting in verse 35, when He says “I sent you out before, and you lacked for nothing…but I’m about to leave, so this time go prepared….take your purse, a backpack, a cloak, and if you don’t have a sword, sell something and go buy one.” Two disciples run up to Him in v.38 and say “Hey, we’ve got two here, are these enough?” and Jesus replies “yes, those will be enough.” The way I read this, since Jesus tells ALL of us to go out into the world, not just 2 out of every 12, He’s simply reassuring the two disciples that those swords/short-swords/long-knives would be adequate. They’re not pocket knives, but probably not a German landsknecht oh-holy-crap sword. They’ll work for what the disiples need. Sorta like someone pulling out a .38 and a 9mm and saying (after clearing them, of course) “are these good for self-defense?” So, unless Jesus returned already and I missed the headlines, we’re still called to go out into the world…whether that world be across the globe, or down the street to the supermarket.

Awesome article, though, AGirl! I have no doubts as to the value of your blog and your own journey, I know I’ve learned quite a bit just reading your blog, and from the comments you’ve made, I know there are countless folks who have had their own dark moment who have made contact and gained the strength to move on and rise above the “willing victim” status due to your sharing. Thank you, and keep it up!

Thank you for your ideals and your blog. My children feel safe because I am armed, not because the police may arrive in ten minutes or an hour! My morals say that protecting my family from evil is my duty, not some mythical society persons. Furthermore, I have seen and experienced evil firsthand. I raise my children to protect themselves, particularly my beloved daughter. I tell her the truth about people and our world because I cannot always be with her. She believes that the only ones that will always protect her are family and herself. I taught her to shoot at age ten, because that was the age I was taught. God bless you, and keep up the good work. My family reads this blog often. Thank you, Bart

The only other place I can think of where this persons “paradise” might be is in solitary confinement in prison (except they have compute access). Likely their utopia is formerly Great Britain where even putting people in prison is considered “too cruel”.

Excellent response and many excellent comments here too. Truly, if you don’t think your life is worth defending with every ounce of your being, then you don’t value yourself. You are fit to be only a slave and likely, that’s the road you are on because eventually someone is going to come along and either make you comply with force or kill you.

happy to say that some of people who read my words and paused to think have moved on to a brighter happier place – no longer under the influence of sad gun-toting paranoid individuals who are unaware they are being used as tools by the gun makers and as canon fodder by the ruling military elite. A Girl, you may sincere in your beliefs but you are massively deluded in thinking a weapon brings anything but more violence. That is why in most modern societies the use of weapons is restricted to trained, responsible and accountable forces – accountable to the people.

Strange as it seems, I’m going to quote the Cornered Cat to you! Actually it was written by Marko (Munchkin Wrangler), and I bet most people have read it. But the troll’s comments made me think of it. Why The Gun is Civilization”.

It’s good I think to respond occasionally. Again, not because of him, but for others reading the post. That post as well as the Open Letter get a lot of hits every week and I have an awful lot of new shooters, so I am happy those folks will have your words(and others) to balance his.

Trolls like this despise the truth for they are evil. I say evil as the troll puts forth a negative assertion of life and its value. When you speak the truth of honest reality they will attempt, as was done, to devalue you and your words. Their reality is the falsehood, the lie, of convictions they want to believe without
the light of fact or logic. When you assert , You have Value, there is no stronger statement in the affirmative about a positive life.

There is no stronger words than You have value. I understand that from when I arrived at that decision for myself.

I have to laugh; trolls are amusing in many ways, but I don’t engage them because there is an old saying from the Kentucky hills whence came some of my Mother’s people – never try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and probably annoys the pig.
It would seem that the cretin who attempted to appear suave and cosmopolitan, must live in a gated community or a compound patrolled by heavily armed guards. And he wants to talk about freedom? If he believes in the shite that he shovels, let hi go live in one of the readily available inner city hellholes and preach his perverse ideas of peace and bruddahood to the local denizens. They will no doubt have a laugh or two before they riddle him with bullets and relieve him of whatever he may have of value. Along with learning, “This is my rifle; there are many like it, but this one is mine” etc. I also learned “You are the weapon; your rifle, your sidearm, your knife – these are tools. But it is you and you alone who stand against the evil that your enemy would perpetrate.”

Perfectly said. I have said it before and I will continue to do so…I believe the tool I choose is just that a tool. Some are better or more effective than others,mbut the real weapon is indeed my mind. It is permanently set to survival. I believe if my tool of choice, the gun, is available to me, I have a better chance of stopping or getting out of a bad guy situation faster, but regardless, I am fighting with everything I have.

He sounds as if he’s in the UK which is besieged by high crime rates and unjust laws.
He has a miserable understanding of our 2nd amendment. If it’s so bucolic there he’s living in lala land. Hope he keeps his promise and stays away.Another oxygen waster.

Better than mine, which was to tell a similer person that: obviously they lived in a perfect world where everyone got along and respected everyone else, but the rest of us lived in the real world, which isn’t so nice.

Please allow me to add my humble congratulations on a fine job and a fine bit of writing – far better writing than this ‘subject’ deserved.
“We” – who are NOT subjects – “hold these truths to be self evident…”
Good on ya.

Thank you for this, my friend. I linked to and commented on it on my blog today, because it’s important to think about. The one other thing I’ll say about your commenter? If he is real and not simply a troll, I sincerely pray that it won’t take the experience of him (or someone he cares about) being victimized to help him realize the error of his ways.

These folks who visualize a disarmed utopia should be reminded that the word “utopia” is derived from Greek roots that mean both “good place” and “no place”. Utopia is lovely to dream about but it doesn’t exist in the real world.

As my dad likes to say, no matter what we wish was true or believe to be true or desperately want to be true, at the end of the day reality generally wins.

I was sent here by Tammy at “Mom with a gun” and am so glad to add you to my blog roll. I’ve spent some time reading your original story and most of the comments… I commend you for your honesty, eloquence and dedication to sharing what you learned with others. Great answer to the troll!

Let me add, for the sake of argument — I believe that anti-gun arguments can be somewhat different, based on whether the proponent does or does not have kids. The former tend to talk about Society… but sometimes the latter are simply afraid for their kids.

To me, it boils down to this. There’s the fear of a goblin threatening you and making you helpless… and there’s the fear of your weapon being used against you or against someone you love. Tell me which issue frightens you more, and you’ll have told me where you stand about guns.

Pro-gun folks deal with the former by arming themselves, and deal with the latter by educating their families about guns. Anti-gun folks deal with the latter by DIS-arming themselves (and their families), and deal with the former by hoping it never happens to them.

I mention this because people in the latter category are not necessarily bad people; they’re afraid for their families, just as we are, but see the bigger threat coming from within, not from without. Because this is an unreasoning fear, arguing with them usually doesn’t get anywhere. If it turns out that their fear is based in ignorance, however — which it often is — then education can be very helpful. (For example, if they don’t know how a firearm works, they’ll have unrealistic ideas, such as imagining them going off accidentally. A trip to the range can make a world of difference there.)

Daniel, yes. I have written several posts trying to make the same point. Many anti gun folks are not hateful people trying to destroy others rights. Many are scared and ignorant of the facts. I would include my former self in that category.

I believe that the person who left the comments on my blog is not that kind of person though. He may be kind and misguided, but he is delusional in his thinking and he has some very dangerous ideas that would leave me vulnerable and even so I would have ignored him, but don’t bring my kid into the argument.

You make some very good points and I appreciate you taking the time to leave them.

Outstanding analysis, Daniel. How to help people overcome their ignorance and fear is a monumental problem on many fronts.

In the meantime, they simply cannot be allowed to disarm the rest of us. And that’s a tough one, but I believe very much that it depends a great deal on our example. We must demonstrate that we are peaceful, ordinary people – just going about our normal business, not wanting to harm anybody – even though we are visibly armed.

Getting them to the range is a late step in the process. Can’t explain anything until you can them to take their fingers out of their ears. 🙂

Yes, yes, yes!! Our example. We shouldn’t have to be an example, but as with self defense, it is less about what should be and what is. In order to be more safe we need to take certain precautions and in order to keep and secure our rights, we need to be good examples of responsible gun owners.